


Duende

by bobbiewickham



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-13
Updated: 2014-02-13
Packaged: 2018-01-12 04:21:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1181822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bobbiewickham/pseuds/bobbiewickham
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bahorel and Prouvaire discuss what makes a person likable.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Duende

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a prompt from PilferingApples.

“What makes you like a person?” Jehan asked one evening. 

They were at one of Jehan’s favorite shabby artistic cafés, and there had been nothing in their prior conversation to lead to this topic. “A willingness to defy the stultifying convention that one should only raise a subject when it is pertinent,” Bahorel said.

Jehan took a moment to understand him, and then blushed rather charmingly, his dark face suffused with violet. “I…oh, curse you, Bahorel, you know what I mean, don’t tease me. I was asking you in earnest.”

Bahorel grinned. “A person may tease, and yet be in earnest.”

“Well, then, tell me seriously. What draws you to someone? What pulls you together with them, like those infernal magnets Joly keeps fiddling with?”

“You’re still miffed because the magnets pulled a button off your doublet, which would not have happened if the buttons were sewn on properly,” Bahorel said, before giving the question some actual thought. It was not one that he had ever considered too deeply. Some people he simply liked, and those he generally liked a great deal; a small handful he loved; others, he detested. There was little complication to it.

“Aggression,” Bahorel finally concluded.

Jehan blinked. “Truly?”

“One might also say ‘passion,’” Bahorel allowed, “but all true passion is aggressive, whether it is obvious or not. All true passion mows down anything in its path.”

Jehan frowned. “But that’s cruel. You are assuming that you won’t be the thing that’s mowed down. I don’t agree that true passion must be heedless of pain.”

“I don’t always object to being mowed down. It depends on the mower.” Bahorel smiled, recollecting the last time he had been knocked flat by someone else’s passion—truly, his mistress was more fun when she was being stern. “And I don’t believe that true passions must be cruel, either. A just world would give all equal freedom to pursue their passions, surely. But passion is always heedless. Not cruel, but honed, seeing only its object and nothing else. An unaggressive person is a dispassionate person.”

“And no one could inspire any passion in you, if they lacked it in themselves,” Jehan mused. “I suppose there’s a sort of logic to it.” He paused. “In the alternative, one might just say that you enjoy punching things, and admire anyone who shares the same trait.”

Bahorel contemplated arguing against this, but decided to kick Jehan’s chair out from under him instead.


End file.
